19thC; Jones Calvert, View of a building ?

A neo-Tudor Gothic building with a symmetrical front is viewed between two trees from a wide walkway. In front of a central octagonal tower is a two-storey bay window, flanked by windows contained within two tower-like structures topped with columns and copulas. Wide shallow steps lead down from a terrace, which is partially enclosed by a wall of decorative stone tracery. A long shadow from the tree on the left falls across the foreground.
There is fading to the upper and lower left corners. A small area of retouching reveals that the print was originally darker.

Educated at Oxford and a mathematician, musician, painter and parson, Calvert Richard Jones was introduced to photography by a cousin of William Henry Fox Talbot, British inventor of the negative/positive process. Subsequently, Jones became one of the few Britons to produce a substantial body of calotype in Britain and abroad. His work stands out in the early development of photography because of his ability to fuse his technical skill with his training as a watercolorist.

Margam Castle, the country house in this photograph, had been built recently by Christopher (Kit) Rice Mansel Talbot (a cousin of W.H.F.Talbot). Calvert Jones was a close friend and neighbour of Kit Talbot; they were contemporaries at Oriel College Oxford and had shared interests.

The west front of Margam Castle is symmetrically placed between two trees. Shadows fall horizontally across the wide steps and foreground interest is created by the angles formed from the wide walk and the lawns a second shadow which falls right across the front of the image.

Margam Castle was built by Christopher Rice Mansel Talbot between 1830 and 1839, though work was not completed on parts of the house, outbuildings and terraces until 1844. It replaced a former mansion demolished by his father at the end of the 18th century. Talbot influenced the design: the octagonal tower at the centre of the photograph was copied from Melbury House and the heraldic shields below the copulas celebrate the long family history. The gothic windows relate to the 12th century origins of the site. The broad walk in the foreground links the new house to a Georgian orangery and the remains of Margam Abbey.

PH.74-1983